Dental insurance annual maximums have been frozen at $1,000-$1,500 since 1973, covering a fraction of what they once did

Most employer-sponsored dental insurance plans cap annual payouts at $1,000 to $1,500 per person -- the same nominal limit set in 1973 -- even though dental care costs have tripled and general inflation has eroded that amount to roughly $9,000-$10,800 in today's dollars. A single root canal plus crown costs $1,600-$3,200 out of pocket, meaning one major procedure can exhaust an entire year's benefit. Why it matters: Annual maximums cover less each year in real terms, so patients defer major restorative work they cannot afford out of pocket, so small cavities progress into infections requiring root canals, extractions, or emergency care, so patients end up in emergency rooms for preventable dental conditions at a collective cost of $2 billion per year, so hospitals absorb uncompensated care costs that get passed on as higher prices for all patients, so the healthcare system spends vastly more treating advanced dental disease than it would have spent on early intervention. The structural root cause is that dental insurance is regulated separately from medical insurance and was originally designed as a modest employer perk rather than comprehensive coverage, and because employers choose plans primarily on premium cost, insurers compete by keeping premiums low rather than raising maximums -- creating a race to the bottom where no single insurer has incentive to unilaterally increase caps.